Seriously now, Satya Sai Baba was a small time magician and a big time crook. His magic tricks were pedestrian and transparent that they could only fool very stupid people. He would “materialize” stuff from thin air. Or so he claimed. But he was an inept magician. Too often his palming was so amateurish that I wish he had had the sense to learn a few tricks from professional stage magicians. (This video is an example of his bumbling silly tricks.)

SSB was a sharp businessman, otherwise. He would materialize bibhuti, “holy ash” (although what’s holy about ash that is not holy about everything in the universe escapes me), and generously distribute it to the poor (although how that helps the poor is also not clear to me.) He would materialize gold chains also but these he reserved for the rich. The rich, in turn, would shower him with tons of gold jewelry. So as I was saying, he was a canny businessman. Take in gold by the tons, and then hand a tiny bit of it back to the same rich people after a conjuring trick. The real trick was how he fooled his followers.

SSB died miserable, it appears. I felt sorry for him. He was bedridden and died of multiple organ failures. It is reported that the people looking after him were impatiently waiting for him to die. They could not wait to get their hands on the wealth that surrounded him. It goes to show that however rich and mighty you may be, in the end, when Yama comes around, it is not a pretty sight.

I have had an acute dislike for SSB. That will not come as a surprise if you know how I feel about “godmen” and their shenanigans. SSB deceived, lied and cheated. He convinced millions of his followers that he was a good man when he himself must have known that he was cheating them. That in my books makes him despicable.

He was a crook. Even if you disregard all other evidence of his dishonesty, just consider this fact. He was praised to the high heavens by the most crooked people alive in India today. Antonia Maino aka Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh, and dozens of high powered politicians praised him. L K Advani went so far as to say, “I believe that spiritual leaders in our country provide sources of de-contamination, de-pollution….”. I understand the need for “de-contamination and de-pollution” for those who have to deal with so much dirty money and fraud on a national scale. It is clearly a confederacy of criminals — the politicians and fraudsters like SSB — that royally screws the ignorant Indian masses.

They gave him a state funeral. They usually do to crooks and charlatans. Teresa, the Merciless, the repulsive Catholic missionary who hobnobbed with cruel dictators and took money stolen from the poor, got a state funeral too. Criminals hold other bigger criminals in high regard and it shows in how the politicians of India revere the masters of deceit and deception.

What I find disgusting about SSB is that he gives Hindus and Hinduism a bad name. It is not a matter of national shame if an average guy diddles kids but when SSB does it, it is ammunition in the hands of the missionaries (who, I suppose, don’t like competition in their diddling of kids) and other enemies of India and Hindus. SSB was known around the world and when he cheated, that too was well known. By his pathetic lies, he drags down Hinduism because too many people associate Hinduism with people like him.

SSB claimed he was god. Of course, from a Advaita Vedantic perspective, he was god. But then so is everyone else in the universe. अहम् ब्रम्ह. I am Bramha. तत्वम असी. I Am That.

The man was a megalomaniac and his delusions of grandeur extended to believing that he was the god that monotheists believe in and that he had sent his son Jesus to earth. There’s something wrong with claiming that you are god of the monotheistic kind. It is a mental disorder routinely suffered by many in lunatic asylums. He was certifiably crazy. He said,

The statement of Christ is simple: “He who sent me among you will come again!” and he pointed to a Lamb. The Lamb is merely a symbol, a sign. It stands for the Voice—Ba-Ba; the announcement was the Advent of Baba. “His Name will be Truth,” Christ declared. Sathya means Truth. “He will wear a robe of red, a bloodred robe.” (Here Baba pointed to the robe He was wearing!). “He will be short, with a crown (of hair). The Lamb is the sign and symbol of Love.”

Christ did not declare that he will come again. He said, “He who made me will come again.”

That Ba-ba is this Baba and Sai, the short, curly-hair-crowned red-robed Baba, is come. He is not only in this Form, but, he is in every one of you, as the dweller in the Heart. He is there, short, with a robe of the colour of the blood that fills it.

Believing you are Jesus Christ’s father is not all that remarkable. Christians believe in all sorts of crazy stuff and so do lots of people from other religions and cults, and so do the inmates of loony bins. It’s all crazy crap but nothing evil or wrong. What’s wrong with what SSB did was the message he sent out through the grand larceny he practiced with impunity. It says that it is ok to lie and to cheat as long as you give some of the proceeds to charitable causes and if important people support you. Those who are seeking ways to rationalize their criminal behavior see what people like SSB do and it gives them comfort and justification to keep on ripping off people.

SSB is dead but his legacy of cheating and ripping off the poor and the gullible will continue. The League of Extraordinarily Crooked Politicians headed by Manmohan Singh will carry on the job.

Gopal Pantha, despite being the true savior of Hindus in Direct Action Day, 16 th August 1946, has always remained as an unheeded character. He has always been labeled as criminal or troublemaker but the time has come to give him his dues.

No ungrateful race can sustain ever and same is the case with Bengali Hindus. The sin they have made by disregarding Gopal Pantha and his contribution can be annulled through paying homage to him.

There is the need of hundreds of Gopal Pantha s to save dying Hindus, nowadays.

Here is a short bio of Gopal Pantha, called mostly as a notorious goon of North Calcutta and leader of a strong army of 800 young men, 33 years old during the said Calcutta carnage. He was born to a Hindu family of butchers, well-known in the vicinity for running a prosperous slaughter-house of goats. Gopal was also conducting the same business during the juncture of the Indian subcontinent. Now one may enquire meaning of the word “Pantha”. In colloquial Bengali language it is meant for a goat. But the sense of responsibility made him switch his target from goats to Islamic crooks roaming in the streets of Calcutta at random.

The situation is best described in the chronicles of Gopal Pantha himself. He stated in BBC "50 years of India’s independence" without any qualms and with conviction, “ I heard that two goalas (milkmen) had been killed in Beliaghata and riots have started in Boubazar ...;it was a very critical time for the country; the country had to be saved. If we become a part of Pakistan, we will be oppressed so I called all my boys and said, this is the time we have to retaliate, and you have to answer brutality with brutality ... We were fighting those who attacked us ... We fought and killed them. So if we heard one murder has taken place, we committed ten more ... the ratio should be one to ten, that was the order to my boys.” It is worthwhile to mention that arms and ammunition were easily available in Calcutta, most prominent military bastion of Allied Forces in South East Asia, those days.

How courageous was Gopal? Two anecdotes are enough to depict it. One of these is related to aged Ghulam Rasool, top leader of the Muslim National Guard (terrorist Muslim organisation, connected to Jinnah's Muslim League and liable for most of the Hindu genocide in Bengal) in Calcutta. He, once during those tumultuous days, asked Gopal Pantha to put an end to all bloodshed. He stated with folded hands, “Bahuth khoon bahchuka...hamari tharaf se bhi aur aapki taraf se bhi. Ab is qatl-e-aam ko rokna hoga. Hum aur khoon kharabe ke liye taiyaar nahee hain. Hum ceasefire ke liye taiyaar hain." In short, Muslim strong-armers were overwhelmed by the virility of Hindus, especially Gopal, and were pleading for a ceasefire only.

Again, as per S. K. Bhattacharjee, a sub-inspector in the Lalbazar police headquarters, he was very ferocious. A time came when Mahtama Gandhi came to Calcutta and tried to convince Gopal along with other Hindu warriors to surrender their arms. But Gopal Pantha was a harder personality for Gandhiji even and remained defiant. In his own words, "I will not lay down even a nail if it has been used for defending Hindu honour."

Why aren't there Gopal Panthas these days? It can only be if Hindu youths conform to the policies of Gopal Pantha and get engaged with physical culture (Shakti Aradhana) instead of wasting time, energy and LIFE.